CHAPTER III. 



The Struggle with the Pratiharas. 



For a long time after the Northern Indian campaign of Govinda III, the 

 Rastrakuta, Bengal enjoyed immunity from Gurjara invasions. The Rastrakutas 

 had barred the Gurjaras so effectively in their desert country, that for the next two 

 or three generations, the Gurjara kings were obliged to remain content with their 

 former boundaries. It was not till the reign of the Gurjara Emperor Bhoja I, 

 Mihira or Adivaraha, that we hear of a Gurjara invasion of Bengal. After his 

 succession to the throne, Devapala was engaged in several lengthy campaigns, and 

 pushed his conquests as far as the Himalayas in the North and the Vindhya Hills in 

 the South : — 



Bhramyadbhir =vijaya-kramena karibhih svam = eva V indhy-dtavlm = uddama- 

 plavamaiia-vaspa-payaso dvstah punar = bandhavah. Kambojesu ca yasya vd]i- 

 vuvabhir = dhvast-anyaraj-aujaso hesa-mis'rita hari-hesita-ravah kantas'-ciram 

 viksitah.—ll. — 19-20. ' 



He met with considerable success in his wars, and we find a corroboration of 

 this statement in an inscription incised at the request of the grandson of his minister, 

 Darbhapani Misra. The Badal pillar inscription records that <c By his (Darbhapani's) 

 policy the illustrious prince Devapala made tributary the earth as far as Reva's 

 parent, whose pile of rocks are moist with the rutting juice of elephants, as far as 

 Gauri's father, the mountain which is whitened by the rays of Isvara's moon, and 

 as far as the two oceans, whose waters are red with the rising and the setting of 

 the sun ": — 



.4 Reva-janakan = matangaja-madastimyac-chila-sanghater = a-gauri-pitur = ISvar 



endu-kiranaih pusyat =sitimno gireh, 

 ^Iarttandas4amay-oday-ariina-jalad-a-varira$i-dvayan =nltya yasya bhuvam cakava 



karadam S>ri-Devapalo nrpah. — verse 5.* 



In the very same inscription another verse refers to the campaigns of the 

 same king and mentions the names of his antagonists in detail. This verse 

 has been assigned to Vigrahapala I by Mahamahopadhyaya Hara Prasada Sastri, 3 

 but in my humble opinion it refers to the king Devapala, for the simple reason 

 that the verse referring to Surapala, the next king after Devapala, according 

 to the Badal pillar inscription, is placed after it. According to this inscription 

 both Darbhapani and his grandson Kedaramisra were the contemporaries of Deva- 

 pala. Somesvara, the son of Darbhapani and the father of Kedaramisra, was 



1 Ind. Ant., Vol. XXI, p. 255. 2 Epi. Ind., Vol. II, p. 162. a Mem. A.S.B, Vol. Ill, p. 8. 



